


where i want to be

by orphan_account



Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/F, Trans Character, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-10
Updated: 2015-12-11
Packaged: 2018-05-05 23:34:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5394416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hope really likes Kelley. Kelley really likes Hope. The only problem is, Kelley thinks her name is Alexander. </p><p>(Closeted trans girl Hope Solo and hella bisexual Kelley O'Hara are dorks that end up as dorks in a dorky relationship.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Early

**Author's Note:**

> I know I have so many WIPS but transwoman hope solo. And, I have a strong outline for the rest of the story. No more than 3-4 installments unless y'all are wild for this story. 
> 
> I am not a transwoman, but I am a transman. If you spot anything that is offensive, I did not mean to be offensive and then please correct me politely in the comments. I hope I have and I want to have accurately portrayed someone who is trans feminine so if you notice anything at all, please tell me. 
> 
> Now after that long a/n, here's the story! If you hit that kudos button or comment, it's guaranteed to make my day better!

Hope's alarm jolts her awake at exactly 5:10. Morning keeper practice doesn't start until 6:30 and Hope could probably get ready and get over to the fields in about thirty minutes. But, Hope knows the defenders are scheduled for morning practice as well, so she rushes through breakfast, shaves in quick, methodical strokes and downs a Powerade on the way over to make it just in time to spend 40 minutes of her morning pretending not to watch the girls run drills and plays. She has her phone out, but her eyes keep following a certain short and freckled defender. When the girl catches her gaze, Hope immediately looks back down at Facebook. She waits for a few seconds before lifting her gaze back up to watch her make a particularly impressive tackle; It's like the other girl didn't have the ball to begin with. God, this girl takes Hope's breath away. 

* * *

Kelley O'Hara is somewhat of an enigma to the student body of Richland High School. Comes from money, moved up from Somewhere Preppy, Georgia. Is an insane soccer player, versatile on the pitch and a great team player. She's pretty enough to be queen bee, but she's content with being popular, but not too popular. Hope knows she mostly hangs out with these other two soccer girls, but that's about it. And that's all anyone knows, really (with the exceptions of her two friends, probably). Kelley tells you just enough so that you feel like you almost know her, but really, you don't know anything about her. She's closed off but she makes you think she's an open book. Personally, Hope finds Kelley absolutely fascinating. 

And really, really pretty. Beautiful. Gorgeous. Okay, she takes Hope's breath away. And she, the big, angry, mean goalkeeper who never smiles, is strangely okay with that. 

So that's why Hope wakes up almost an hour early, pretends that she just mixed up the time and watches the defenders semi-covertly over the top of her phone. 

* * *

Hope's working at one goal with a coach while the second string works at another. Her coach is sending in ball after ball, testing her reactive saves. Hope loves the intellectual game, setting up her backline so she doesn't even need to make the save, careful analysis and preparation off the field, but the reactive game is what sets her heart on fire. She can feel her muscles tense and release, the burn immediately cooled by the autumn morning breeze. She She loves the stark contrast of being weightless in the air and grounded on the grass. 

Today, she's killing it. She isn't keeping track or anything, but her save percentage is probably near 90. She can see her coach getting progressively more excited as practice goes on. There's a look in his eyes that Hope can't quite place (maybe it's pride) and it makes something flutter in her chest. Nobody's ever been this proud of her before. 

When 7:30 rolls around, her coach claps her on the back, a huge smile stretched across his face, "Alexander, beautiful practice amigo! Keep that up and we will be state champions!" 

And suddenly, the illusion she's created for herself crumbles around her and Hope is reminded that she is too tall and too muscular and too masculine to ever be anything other than Alexander. 

As she trudges to the boys' locker room, she reminds herself that it really wasn't that bad of a practice. One comment shouldn't tear her down. But it's not just one comment. It's newspaper articles and coaches and teachers and classmates constantly reminding her that she can't ever be Hope Solo. 

* * *

Hope usually eats lunch alone. It's not like she doesn't have any friends- she has lots of them -but she just chooses to be by herself. She usually works on homework (college applications this year), so the time goes by pretty quickly. But today, Carli joins her. They aren't that close, but both soccer teams tend to run in the same social circles. Besides Kelley, Carli is the most bearable of the generally overly excitable girls' team. 

She also never calls her Alexander. 

"Hey, Solo," Carli says, casually sliding next to her. 

"Lloyd," Hope returns, still engrossed in the reading assigned in history. 

"I heard you've been slaying that save percentage. Coach says you're up to a 94." 

Hope looks up at Carli and smiles shyly, "Yeah?" 

"Yup," she nods. 

"That's... Nice of her," she says, not quite knowing how to handle the praise. 

Carli snorts, "Please. Ellis never compliments anybody. She must think you're pretty fucking special." 

"Well you know, Lloyd, you're pretty damn special yourself. A midfield goal? Seriously?" 

Carli shrugs with the perfect amount of cockiness, "I'm Carli Lloyd, bud." 

"Always egotistical..." 

The pair share a laugh. Hope is immediately self conscious of the octaves between their voices. Hope tries to lighten hers, but not so much that Carli notices. 

"I'm serious Carli, you're amazing. You deserve every freaking award in the world." 

It's Carli's turn to blush, but it barely shows through her deep and tanned skin. 

"Alex, what've you done to make Cold-Hearted Carli actually feel things?" 

Hope winces slightly at the name, but smiles afterwards, recognizing Kelley's voice. It's a little deeper than most girls', and her cadence is heavy, almost leaning masculine. Hope sometimes wonders if she was born with XX chromosomes, would she sound more like Kelley? A tad brash but when she's speaking intellectually you can't help but believe everything she says? Or would she sound more like Ashlyn Harris? Light and surprisingly feminine for her presentation? 

"Hey space cadet," Kelley snaps in front of Hope's face, "You on a mission to Mars?" 

Hope's face reddens, "Sorry about that, sometimes I get on these long trains of thoughts and kind of forget to get off," she says sheepishly. 

"S'okay bud, I do it all the time too." 

Hope is stuck thinking of a witty reply for two seconds before the lunch bell rings. Literally saved by the bell. 

"Well, it was cool talking to you, and maybe see you around, Alexander?" 

Hope suppresses another wince, "Sure. Yeah. That would be, um, neat." 

Neat? Who even says neat anymore? She thinks she's going to die of embarrassment. Hope quickly spins around to leave, but Kelley stops her by grabbing her left arm. She scribbles on it quickly with hot pink sharpie and pushes Hope back to her original direction. 

"Don't be a stranger, stranger! Call or text or fax or whatever me at 555-6780, Kelley," Hope reads aloud. 

First of all, hot pink sharpie. Why does Kelley even own one? 

Second of all, Hope's not so smooth ass totally got Kelley's number. 

It takes Hope a lot of effort to restrain from skipping to English Literature. 

When Hope takes her seat, redfaced and out of breath, Carli turns to her, brow arched, "Kelley O'Hara, Solo?" 

Hope just smiles happily and nods, "Kelley O'Hara, Lloyd."


	2. Motherly Advice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not much happens but important character development is important.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's such a filler chapter! The next one will definitely have more action in it. But for now, learn more back story and how much of an over thinker Hope is. I changed Marcus to a younger brother just cuz (no, I wanted him in the house and some sort of age difference so younger it was). 
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoy and please hit kudos or leave a comment if you did!

"So does she mean soccer and dinner friend-date or soccer and dinner date-date?" Hope says as she shoves her phone and her recent texts with Kelley in the face of Jerramy, her best friend and neighbour, as they walk home.

"I dunno man. Girls are fucking wild, don't get 'em at all," he says, shrugging his shoulders.

If only he knew, Hope thinks. She wonders what he'd say if she just went _"I'm a girl and I'm not impossible to understand, am I?"_ The insecure part of her imagines him flipping out and beating her up and leaving her for the cops in the morning, but Hope's logical side also knows that he's a sweet guy and he's pretty open minded as well. When Robbie Rogers came out as gay last year, most of the soccer team was okay with it, but a lot of the football players made a big fuss. Jerramy was thankfully not one of them. Hope thinks that maybe he wouldn't be that bad of a first person to come out to.

If she ever comes out.

Hope, well Alexander really, was recruited to ODP last year and who even knows what the rules are for a transperson competing nationally; It's never happened before. She can't give up soccer, it's her ticket out of this godforsaken town and away from her mom and stepdad and to somewhere better, Seattle maybe. But Hope also can't go on living like this. Every day her dysphoria gets worse. Every day she swears that her shoulders are broadening and her voice is getting deeper and her facial hair is filling in more and it scares the _shit_ out of her. What if she's too late? What if the testosterone in her body has changed her so much already that she'll never be able to feel like herself?

"Hey, see ya tomorrow man. And good luck with O'Hara. She's a catch," Jerramy calls to her, running over to his house on the other side of the street.

"Oh! Uh yeah, thanks man," She replies after a delay. Hope really needs to stop spacing out like that.

She slips through her front door quietly, just in case her mom or her stepdad or Marcus is napping on the living room couch. She grabs an apple from the fruit bowl in the kitchen and tiptoes quickly up the stairs. Once in her room, she throws her duffle and school bag unceremoniously onto her bed and drops onto her desk chair. Hope slides over to her ancient computer, opens up the browser and types in _how to know a girl wants to go out as friends or together_.

It's worth a shot, okay.

Clicking on the first few results, Hope quickly finds that pretty much every article thinks she's a man. She's slightly bothered by this, but she forges on anyways in the off chance that there's a good piece of advice buried somewhere in the heteronormativity. She has no luck. Nothing on the internet even touches on slightly ambiguous text messages. Hope turns off her computer, leans back in her chair and sighs. She really didn't have to come to this.

"What did you want to ask me, honey?" Her mother says after Hope locates her mom and brings her back to her room.

"Um, how do you know if a girl wants to hang out, but like, as _more_ or just as friends?" Hope asks awkwardly. She's decided that there is nothing worse than getting advice on your crush from your parents.

"Alexander! Why didn't you tell me there was a girl sooner?"

Hope reddens, "Mom, she just gave me her number yesterday and we texted for the first time today."

Her mother arches an eyebrow, asking a silent question.

"No mom, I'm not lying. Now could you please just help me out?"

"Show me the messages."

Hope passes over her phone. Her mother moves her glasses from the top of her head to her nose and starts to make what Hope calls 'Analysis Noises'.

"Well, I'd say she's being more than friendly. But, I don't know this girl. What's she like?"

See, this is why Hope hates asking her mom for anything. She always asks a million and one side questions instead of getting straight to the point. In terms of personality, Hope and her mother are near polar opposites.

"She's... Nice?"

"Honey, if that's all you can come up with I think this Kelley girl will have better luck elsewhere."

"I wasn't finished, mom," Hope replies, tone edging into her voice, "And she plays soccer. Really, really well. Kelley's amazing. She can play almost anywhere on the field, and does a pretty great job at it too. She's from Georgia and pretty into shooting sports and stuff. I don't have any classes with her evaluate she's really into science. Still, we end up talking a lot whenever the teams are together because her best friends are like two peas in a pod and the teams are too loud for Jerramy to stick around for long.

"She's really smart too. Wants to go to Stanford and study some fancy science degree and play soccer for them too. And despite the fact that she's probably way out of my league both intelligence-wise and everything else, we click really well."

Hope falls silent, realizing how long she had been talking. Maybe she was falling for Kelley more than she thought.

Hope's mom gives her a warm smile, that same emotion that her coach had earlier behind her eyes as well, "Alexander, she sounds wonderful and you two seem like a perfect pair. I have no doubt that tomorrow will go well."

Hope combs a hand back through her hair, which is starting to tickle her forehead, "Thanks mom."

Her mom squeezes her shoulder affectionately as she leaves, "You're welcome honey."

A few seconds later, she pops her head back through Hope's door, "I'm happy for you, Alex. The way you talk about her makes her sound like the one for you."

"I think she might be," Hope admits under her breath. But her mom has already left and Hope's fairly certain she didn't hear a thing. Hopefully she didn't.

Hope's mother pops in one last time to warn her about bringing nicer clothes to change into for dinner and to not bring her white Oxford because it 'makes you look like a twenty year old Mormon coming to convert me'.

When her mother finally leaves for good, Hope notices the smile on her face. Today was a good day. Her relationship with her mother is complicated. Sometimes she's overbearing and essentially the textbook PTA-parent and other times she's drunk off her ass and treats her and Marcus like they don't exist. She's kind of accepted her mother's inconsistencies, but Marcus shouldn't have to deal with it. He's a sophmore, just barely a teenager. He deserves someone there for him. Hope often wishes that she was maybe a year younger, so that she could keep an eye out for him and be there for him for another year. But, all she'd be doing is preventing him from growing up, and he's going to have to do that some time. As much as she hates to admit it, Marcus isn't her baby brother anymore.

Hope suddenly realizes how tired she is. A daily double as well as getting up an hour earlier for Kelley has worn Hope far beyond her usual routine.

Hope decides a bath is in order.

She turns the hot tap on to full blast and pours a small bit of her secret bubble bath soap from her beat up cub scout canteen. It seems silly to be so secretive and Hope knows that plenty of guys probably have bubble baths from time to time, but she can't risk anyone finding out because then she might have to come out, and if she comes out, there goes soccer, and if she loses soccer then she'll be stuck working at some dead end job, still living at home and stuck as Alexander for her entire life. She'll go to college, play through her four years and then quit and fall back into the shadows. She loves soccer, almost more than anything, but she doesn't love it more than finally being able to be Hope Solo. But she still doesn't know where Kelley fits into all of this. Hell, she doesn't even know if Kelley likes her at all right now. But, if she happens to actually like Hope and if she ends up not caring that she's actually a girl, Hope doesn't know how to work Stanford in. She's smart, but she's not Stanford smart, and she can't take away Kelley's dream.

Hope sighs. She's overthinking again. She shuts off the taps as the tub is nearing full. The floral scent snakes it's way up to Hope's nose and she breathes in the calming scent. Hope quickly strips, shirt, jeans, socks and finally she's left in her boxers. She takes a deep breath and slides them off in a quick motion without looking down. Hope lowers herself into the near scalding bubbles, feeling her muscles decompress. A gasp slips out of her lips; this feels incredible. Hope feels like the stress she's been holding in for the past few weeks is finally being released.

And then suddenly, her thoughts turn back to Kelley. Her freckles. The way her nose crinkles up when she smiles. Her assertiveness and physicality on the pitch that Hope can't help but find incredibly sexy. She can feel herself get hard and Hope instinctively reaches a hand towards _it_. As soon as a finger touches, she immediately feels awful. Once again reminded that she'll always be Alexander. Hope isn't in the mood for her bath anymore. She gets out, towels off quickly, finds some sweats and a hoodie, and curls up in bed.

She doesn't fall asleep for a while, her thoughts plagued by Kelley.


End file.
